Vorstellung von Tod und Jenseits in der Frühchristlichen Grabinschriften der Oikumene

The project “Mors secundum epigrammata christiana antiqua” is based on the compilation of inscriptions of the third to the sixth century from the Oikumene. These inscriptions speak about death and afterlife and display similarities and differences of ideas about life after death in East and West. Important themes in both West and East are the community with God or Christ, which is already prominent in the early inscriptions from the West, and statements referring to the eternal life, which can generally be found from the fourth century onward. In the East, invocations of God are particularly numerous and show the affectionate interest and solicitude of the living for the post mortem fortune of their dead. However, resurrection and final judgement are not an important theme either in the East nor in the West; the hereafter is depicted very positively, in contrast to the negative or indifferent afterlife of paganism. The refrigerium, a famous theme in the Christian Latin epitaphs of the 3rd and 4th century, does not appear in the grave inscriptions of the East. When merits are mentioned, the persons often belong to elevated social spheres. The forgiveness of sins is rarely mentioned in the grave inscriptions of East or West and hardly ever with reference to the afterlife; clearly, contrary to standard views, it was not important in a funerary context and gains importance only in the Middle Ages.